Intraorganizational Influence

This study explored the influence of communication networks on job-related opinions in a public organization. Theoretical discussion pointed out that opinions of one’s own work and opinions of the organization represent two types of job-related opinions that might be differently attuned to social influence. Moreover, discussion of social influence mechanisms has suggested that current measurement of positional social influence suffers from a serious conceptual problem. According to the empirical results, job-related opinions were affected by social influence after controlling for other relevant variables. Opinions of the organization were more vulnerable to social influence than opinions of one’s own work. Structural equivalence was the most prominent mechanism of social influence. This study offers an alternative method of measuring positional social influence.